Almost Half of Americans Live Paycheck to Paycheck
Newsmax
Business Insider declares that it "could be the scariest chart in the world" — a graphic showing that nearly half of American households don't save any of their money and therefore have nothing to fall back on if they miss a paycheck.
The graphic from Deutsche Bank, based partly on data from the Federal Reserve System's Survey of Consumer Finance, shows that 47 percent of U.S. households were living paycheck to paycheck when the data was compiled.
That's down slightly from 2010, but significantly higher than in 2001, when it was below 41 percent.
"People who don't save won't have any buffer should the economy turn and they lose their jobs," Business Insider observed. "Longer term, people who don't save won't have the capacity to retire. It's not good."
A surprising report from the Brookings Institution last year disclosed that two-thirds of households living paycheck to paycheck are actually middle class.
These middle class households have a median income of $41,000 a year, according to a CNN article on the Brookings findings. They don't have liquid assets, such a savings accounts or mutual fund holdings, but they do have homes and retirement accounts, with a median net worth of $41,000, CNN reported.
Poor hand-to-mouth households typically have yearly incomes of $21,000 and no assets.
Families that do not live paycheck to paycheck have median incomes of $51,000 and assets of $116,000.
Most financial planners suggest that people should put aside three to six months of expenses in case of an emergency, CNN reported, but "few actually do."
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